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We have all been to events where you get settled into your seat, only for someone or a busload to arrive late, forcing you to twist and turn your legs or to stand and do the limbo, so they can pass by. Usually your feet get stepped on and your shins get kicked, requiring medical attention. It’s usually the same person or group who gets up umpteen times to use the restroom.

Have you ever played the passive-aggressive game with them? You make them work for their seat. You force them to walk on tiptoes because you didn’t swing your legs out of the way. Or you force them to perform the standing broad jump. Or you express your frustration with a weird look and irritating sigh while staring at your watch. You want them to know their tardiness is a major annoyance to the whole universe. Don’t you think there need to be some written rules of etiquette for large public gatherings and the Terminator to enforce them?

Well, I mention this because in Jesus’ day there were truckloads of rules during a public worship service. Those services were so stiff and liturgical that rigid rules dominated the worship experience. You showed up on time. There was no chitchat or coffee runs. No beepers or cell phones allowed. Distracting people were escorted out. No one got up during the sermon to leave. If you remembered in the middle of the service that you left the pot roast in the oven on high, you didn’t run home; you considered it a burnt offering as unto the Lord.

Now against that cultural backdrop, Jesus did something unthinkable. He broke the rules of etiquette by offering a free pass for anyone to get up in the middle of a service and leave. This pass allowed you to be sorta rude—to stand up, gather up your stuff, climb over people and head for the exit, provided you were leaving for the right reason.

In His famous sermon—the Sermon on the Mount—Jesus gives us only one right reason—one justifiable cause to leave a worship service. It is to repair a broken or estranged relationship. Here’s what Jesus said in Matthew 5:23–24, "So if you are standing before the altar in the Temple, offering a sacrifice to God, and you suddenly remember that someone has something against you, leave your sacrifice there beside the altar. Go and be reconciled to that person. Then come and offer your sacrifice to God."

Jesus’ words would have come as bombshell because they broke some of the worship service rules of etiquette and put right relationships on a par with right worship. It never occurred to the rule-enforcing religious leaders that their relationship with God was bound up so closely to their relationships with others. They had totally missed how God felt about loving one another.

Why do we need the free pass? Let me back up a step to Jesus’ comments just before offering the free pass. Matthew 5:21–23 says, "You have heard that the law of Moses says, ‘Do not murder. If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment.’ But I say, if you are angry with someone, you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the high council. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell."

Jesus is saying, "Outwardly, you appear so religious and pious because you haven’t murdered anyone. You think you have met heaven’s standard for relationships. You think your hands are clean, but your hearts are really blood-spattered. Look at how you treat each other; look at the calloused words you use; look at names you call each other. Look at your destructive anger toward others—your character assassinations. You’ve become a relational lethal weapon."

Notice how Jesus describes the progressive nature of anger and its affect on relationships. Jesus said, "if you are angry with someone, you are subject to judgment!" Now, we know from other Scriptures that Jesus didn’t prohibit all anger. He’s not referring to the kind of righteous anger that motivates us to deal with a problem and resolve it. The word Jesus uses for "anger" describes a slow-burning anger. It’s a brooding, passive-aggressive simmering; festering, grudge-holding anger that we refuse to let go of.

For example, a married couple had a fight and ended up giving each other the silent treatment. A week into their mute argument, the man realized he needed his wife's help. To catch a flight to Chicago for a business meeting, he had to get up at 5 a.m. Not wanting to be the first to break the silence, he wrote on a piece of paper, "Please wake me at 5 a.m."

The next morning the man woke up only to discover his wife was already out of bed, it was 9 a.m., and his flight had long since departed. He was about to chew out his wife when he noticed a piece of paper by the bed. It said, "It's 5 a.m. Wake up." Jesus makes it clear. You give into this kind of forbidden anger, and you’re risking God’s judgment on your life. It ruins relationships and ruins your worship.

Jesus goes on to say that if you don’t deal with your slow simmering anger, it will escalate into an angry stage of arrogant contempt. "If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the high council." The word "idiot" was the ancient Aramaic word "Raca" that literally meant empty head, brainless idiot, stupid bonehead. This form of anger says, "I want to damage you because you’re a dirt bag, a worthless idiot and you don’t belong in my life."

Jesus said anyone who expresses such arrogant contempt should be put on trial before the Jewish Supreme Court. Obviously, there was no actual law on the books prohibiting "Raca;" Jesus was making the point: if you speak contemptuously to someone, you’re committing a sin—you’re breaking a law—you’re answerable to a judge.

But Jesus goes on to warn that if you don’t put an end to the slow burn and you fail to deal with your arrogant contempt toward someone, you could fall into a more serious stage of anger called malice or cursing. And "if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell." "Cursing" is often translated "you fool." It was a term that not only insulted a person’s intellect but also their morals.

This malicious anger combines all that is evil with simmering anger and contempt to inflict pain. You pick fights. You take people down. You take their name and reputation from them and brand them as stupid, empty-headed goof offs. Jesus said that if you curse another person, you are in danger of the fires of hell. You are deserving of the severest judgment of all. Anger can eat your lunch. It destroys our relationships and us. It even causes us to become irrational.

An angry man walked into a Burger King in Ypsilanti, Michigan, at 7:50 a.m., flashed a gun and demanded cash. The clerk said he couldn't open the cash register without a food order. When the wannabe robber ordered onion rings, the clerk said they weren't available for breakfast. The angry, frustrated man stormed out of the restaurant. (I hear he headed across the street to McDonald's, demanding an Egg-On-My-Face McMuffin.)

So to recap, Jesus is raising the bar on relationships. If the law is simply "do not murder"—well, that’s easy to keep. You can burn on the inside with anger, you can hate with every fiber of your being, but if you don’t kill, you’re still okay with God. You can look with disgust and contempt, you can call a man every nasty name you can think of to destroy his reputation, but if you don’t kill him, you get an "A" in religion.

Jesus is saying, "Not so." Your relationship with God is dynamically tied to your relationships with others. Your anger is on the same level as murder. 1 John 4:20–21 tells us, "If someone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates a Christian brother or sister, that person is a liar…." You can’t be in a right relationship with God when you’re not right with others. Religious rituals won’t get you anywhere if your heart isn’t right with others.

Jesus is poking around in people’s hearts. He wants you to know that in His kingdom, hearts of love, kindness, openness, gentleness and grace are what He is looking for in His followers. Nothing short of that will do. External handshakes, slaps on the back, plastic smiles will not do.

Fortunately, Jesus didn’t expose our heart attitudes, our anger and damaged relationships without pointing us toward the spiritual high road of relationships with others. He’s telling us to let our anger go—to 1. Reconcile with others. We looked at this earlier. Matthew 5:23–24, "So if you are standing before the altar in the Temple, offering a sacrifice to God, and you suddenly remember that someone has something against you, leave your sacrifice there beside the altar. Go and be reconciled to that person. Then come and offer your sacrifice to God."

Jesus is saying it’s not enough just to go through the motions of worship. To really worship God and build your relationship with Him, you must be reconciled to those you have hurt. You made a promise and didn’t keep it. You borrowed money but never paid it back. You broke your vow. You gossiped. You called them a name. You uncorked your anger on someone. You sinned against them. Go to the person; seek forgiveness; make it right. It’s your job to reconcile and not leave conflicts or fractured relationships unresolved. Let it go! Colossians 3:8 says, "But now is the time to get rid of anger, rage, malicious behavior, slander, and dirty language."

Why--because these things destroy relationships and ruin our worship.

A second step to taking the relational highroad is to 2. Settle matters quickly. Jesus said in Matthew 5:25–26, "Come to terms quickly with your enemy before it is too late and you are dragged into court, handed over to an officer, and thrown in jail. I assure you that you won't be free again until you have paid the last penny."

In Jesus’ day, Roman law allowed for a person who was owed money to have the borrower arrested if the borrower failed to pay what was due. It was common for the accuser to grab the deadbeat’s tunic and drag him to the local magistrate. Clearly it was in the best interest of the borrower to settle things quickly before receiving a stiff fine or jail time for not making the payment.

In light of taking the relational high road, Jesus challenges us to respond quickly if there is anger, bitterness, quarrels, disputes, or disagreements in our relationships. Otherwise, it will become toxic and our anger will spiral into resentment, bitterness, and hardened hearts. This is why the Apostle Paul warns us in Ephesians 4:26, "And don't sin by letting anger gain control over you. Don't let the sun go down while you are still angry…" Reconcile by settling matters quickly or face uncertain and painful consequences.

Are you harboring any forbidden anger that Jesus equates with murder? Do you have anger that simmers from a grudge, anger that shows contempt, anger that attacks other’s character? In Jesus’ mind, this carries the same seriousness with it as if you had murdered someone. Friends, don’t sacrifice an abundant and meaningful life by holding onto your anger. Jesus’ directive is simple—reconcile—square it up with others—and do it quickly before it becomes toxic. As it says in Romans 12:18, "Do your part to live in peace with everyone, as much as possible." Who are you not at peace with right now?

Angry people nailed Jesus to a cross 2,000 years ago. Their simmering anger boiled over into contempt and malice. They called Him names. They mocked Him. They spit on Him. They probably chanted "Raca." Yet Jesus chose to live the high road—to live in peace by loving and forgiving them of their sins through His death on the cross.

The Bible explains the event in Romans 5:8, "But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners." He died to pay the penalty for all our moral mistakes. It was a wonderful cross where God made peace with us and reconciled us to Him. He asks us to do the same with others.